Letter to Editor 2003 - Ottawa Citizen: Ernie Eves on the Road

OTTAWA CITIZEN LETTER TO EDITOR

Morgan Duchesney: June 18, 2003

ERNIE EVES: THE ROAD TO THE GOLF COURSE OR WHEREVER

I recently received a publication from the PC Party of Ontario called: The Road Ahead. Perhaps they should call it The Road to the Golf Course. This neoconservative propaganda organ is the current Ontario government’s attempt to undo the damage done by Ernie Eve’s endless flip-flops. As far as I’m concerned, he can flip-flop his way to political oblivion and we will all be better off for the change.

The main point of this letter is my objection to the social assistance nonsense on page 41 of The Road Ahead. They talk about a new child tax credit to protect poor children from the, “…stigma of being on welfare.” This is coming from a government that rode the scapegoating of welfare recipients to back-to-back majorities in 1995 and 1999 and intentionally exacerbated the welfare stigma to their own advantage. What we have here is a government craftily employing the concept of deserving and undeserving poor to further their own ends. To add to the hypocrisy, the Ontario PC government is still ‘clawing back’ the federal child tax credit from social assistance recipients with children. I don’t know how the new provincial credit will affect the federal credit and they don’t explain. Look to them to renege on this promise if they win the election.